I was criticized for this tweet. I agree, I made a mistake. The mistake I made was that I didn't explain in enough detail what the problem actually is, and what I believe the solutions are. I'm going to explain. https://twitter.com/kateatherley/status/1355743879643934721

The problem is that the instruction "place a marker and join for working in the round" **without further detail** is unhelpful for less experienced knitters, if you're working DPNs/magic loop/2 circulars. 1/

This instruction is bad in this context because a conventional, ring-style marker, used in a conventional manner, doesn't work in this context. You can't keep a marker on the end. 2/

Now, you absolutely do need to keep track of the start of the round when working these small-circumference projects. And there's a bunch of great ways to do it! 3/

Some put a ring-style marker between first and second stitch. Some clip a removeable marker in the fabric, in or near the first stitch. A lot of time, I just keep track of the tail. 4/

All of these are great solutions. But a newer knitter doesn't know that. "Place marker at the start of your DPN and join for working in the round" (or similar) just leads to confusion. 5/

I believe that in this situation the patterns need to explain it differently. For patts for more experienced knitters, I typically say "note or mark start of round", leaving it to their choice. 6/

For patts for less experienced knitters, I think we should provide an instruction that actually works, y'know. That is, something more specific - whether it's one solution or several. For example "to mark the start of the round, place a marker between the 1st & 2nd sts". 7/

Or provide a list of suggestions, if you want! Yes, knitters need to keep track of the start of round. And we all have ways to do it that work. I bet people are doing things I haven't thought of, and that's cool! Just don't write an instruction that's actually *impossible*. /end